1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to material handling equipment, and more particularly, to a vertical carousel for lumber that provides storage for an efficient selection of lengths, sizes, and grades of wood.
2. Description of the Related Art
Modern sawmills typically require that lumber be transported on conveyors. Several conveyors for lumber have been developed in the past. None of them, however, facilitates storage for a selection of lumber lengths, sizes, and grades for performing other functions such as a cutting operation.
Applicant believes that one of the closest references correspond U.S. Pat. No. 5,161,929 issued to Lichti, Sr. on Nov. 10, 1992 for an automated work center. However, it differs from the present invention, because Lichti, Sr. teaches an automated integrated workstation for handling goods within distribution and production environments. Furthermore, Lichti, Sr. teaches that the workstation is specifically adapted for consolidating goods.
Applicant believes that another reference corresponds U.S. Pat. No. 5,593,269 issued to Bernard, II on Jan. 14, 1997 for an automated work center. However, it differs from the present invention, because Bernard, II teaches an automated work center for use in material handling operations. More specifically, Bernard, II teaches a work center including a randomly accessible vertically moving temporary storage queue 11 for receiving containers 25 that holds material goods. A fixed loading ramp 20 is arranged to receive containers 20 from an external system and to load the received containers onto the storage queue 11. A work area 5, having a plurality of rotatable worktables 7, provides and gives an operator access to the containers. A delivery system 14 transfers containers between the storage queue 11 and the worktables 7, and a takeaway system 16 transfers containers between the work area and the conveyor network. An automated control system 17 coordinates the delivery of containers between the temporary storage queue 11 and the work area 5. A consolidation queue 18, having a multiplicity of vertically spaced shelves, may be disposed opposite the worktables 7 to facilitate the consolidation of ordered goods.
Other patents describing the closest subject matter provide for a number of more or less complicated features that fail to solve the problem in an efficient and economical way.
None of these patents suggest the novel features of the present invention. Such novel features include efficiently providing a single in-feed operator an arm's length selection of lengths, sizes, and grades of wood members to choose from, thus not limiting the operator to stopping a cutting operation and placing the desired selection of wood nearby.